Intro

The BlackBerry 9320 is Research in Motion’s new stylish offering into its curve range of smartphones. Built with the socially connected in mind, out of the box, it offers built-in “social-centric” features…including a dedicated hardware BlackBerry messenger key, a battery to maintain those social connections and offers the full no-compromise BlackBerry experience longtime Blackberry users are used to while managing to stay pocket friendly…both literally and in terms of the cost.

Hardware / design

The 9320 has a sleek look; it is wrapped around a gunmetal grey plastic band which passes off as metal…this gives it a premium look. I passed the phone around some regular everyday folk and quite a number asked if it was a new, smaller bold (not curve).

The first thing you notice when you pick it up is how nice it feels in the hand,

Adcrack’s first remark during his hands on time with the device was about how nice it was to hold. It weighs 113grams, 4 grams more than its predecessor the 9360 and is also 1.7mm thicker. The trend now for devices is: the thinner and lighter, the better but in this case, the added weight and thickness in addition to the rounded sizes make the 9320 much nicer in the hands.

In terms physical attributes, you get the default curve look, a row of four raised hardware buttons, two on each side of an optical track pad separates a 2.4 inch display (more on this below) and the traditional BlackBerry curve keyboard…individual keys all slanting away from the centre (this helps with accuracy and also makes you feel the keyboard is larger than it actually is).You find a slit housing the earpiece and the iconic LED notification light above the screen. The back sports a minimalistic design, shiny black battery cover with the BlackBerry logo engraved and the word “curve” engraved between its 3.2 megapixel camera and flash.

Going round the perimeter of the device, you will find a 3.5mm earphone jack, right beside the screen lock key on top, a volume rocker with a play/pause button and a convenience key that’s set to launch the camera (and take pictures while the camera is open by default. The other side houses a micro usb jack and a second convenience key marked BBM and is set to launch BBM by default. The external speaker and microphone are located at the bottom.

Overall, the build is pretty solid and aesthetics pleasing however I do have a few issues with the device’s build. The phone is a fingerprint magnet, did not help that I was coming from a 9900 bold…as I kept touching (and smudging the screen). Also my review unit did “leak” backlight from underneath the two call keys. I was going to raise an issue about attention to detail in the design process with regards to the leak, but Babse’s unit did not have the same issue. Typing on the curve keyboard coming from any other device feels a bit “clicky” at first, but the tactile feedback grows on you and becomes addictive after a short while.